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Friends, I have recently added a lovely vintage tuba to the collection. It is a small Bb tuba, 18 mm bore, perhaps similar to a Miraphone model 84. Lovely sound, good intonation, but not really ready to play due to the old linkages. The tuba is so old that there are no numbers or markings on it. Can anyone offer a guess about the manufacturer and the probable decade it was made?
The photos are here - http://sinfonica.art/daniel/
Thank you for your thoughts, Daniel

Other than the odd-shaped 2nd slide, this looks like an old Miraphone, or possibly a Cerveny.
If an old Cerveny, look on the bar supporting the clock-work springs for a serial number.

It's a very beautiful handmade tuba. Lovely work on the bell with the V-shaped cut in it. I don’t remember how that is called again, but my Hirsbrunner from 1927 has it also. That's how it was done in the old days. The "looped" second valve tubing reminds me of Czech Made Tubas/Helicons, but possibly also (east) German.

It's called a gusset.

Those round backplates on the thumb ring and strap loops are Cerveny hallmarks.

I suspect the Czech/Cerveny is closest to the mark. The detail on the krantz, slides and rotors are similar to my 1910's helicon from that region.

Also the bar of the machine where each valve screws in is similar. I have yet to see a miraphone like that.

Thank you to everyone for their thoughts!!

I would like to share a brief note from a friend in Germany who works with vintage tubas and has seen many over the decades. His observations were as follows:

"Your tuba looks to have been made sometime in the 1920s to 1930s although it could be a tuba body from 1900 with a 1920-30s valve block. The valve block, bracing and seam design point to manufacture in Markneukirchen / Klingenthal although its difficult to say who made it."

Both Markneukirchen and Klingenthal are cities very close to the Czech (Bohemian) border, so I think that we have pinned down the general region. Klingenthal is only 5 km from Kraslice (Graslitz) where Amati is based and where many other great musical instrument manufacturers were based in the past, such as Bohland & Fuchs, Hüller & Co., A.K.Hüttl, Julius Keilwerth, Karl Püchner, Adolf Rölz, Ant. Kohlert.

Looks a lot like my Franz Schediwy BBb Made in Ludiwigsberg.

yes! lovely tuba you have!!
https://photos.app.goo.gl/UhxofseZLkNkCuLd9" target="_blank" target="_blank

danontuba wrote:yes! lovely tuba you have!!
https://photos.app.goo.gl/UhxofseZLkNkCuLd9" target="_blank" target="_blank" target="_blank

Oh boy! a Tuba marked to a German FLAK regiment. I guess they had to do something while waiting for planes to appear.